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Lungbarrow

Roots: Gormenghast, Gothic novels, Jack and the Beanstalk, Snow White (the mirrors). Satthralope is reminiscent of Miss Havisham from Great Expectations.

Goofs: How come Leela is still alive (and still fertile!)? She arrived on Gallifrey when the Doctor was around 750, the Doctor is now over 1000. Therefore, about 250 years have passed on Gallifrey. Even with Sevateem biology and Time Lord medical technology (assuming she used it), Leela should be biologically in very old age.

When Chris is viewing events from 673 years before, he seems able to interact to a minor degree. How is this possible?

Innocet seems to think that a TARDIS is the only way to get into the House, but the Time Lords must have loads of technologies that would enable someone to travel through the earth (e.g. Time Rings). They almost certainly have transmat-type technology that doesn't need a terminal. [This is probably how Romana, Ferrain and the CIA agents get in later.]

Innocet says she's glad none of the Doctor's other important friends are here to see this, but there's no way she should know that he has important friends. [Maybe she picked up some extra information when probing the Doctor's mind.]

On page 216 (chapter 24), Jobiska claims to be 299, just after remembering events she claims were 506 years ago. This age has to be wrong because the youngest cousin is Owis, who's 675. This figure also conflicts with her claimed age of 3462 on page 86 (chapter 9) and 4332 on page 34 (chapter 4).

This is quite nitpicky, but on page 80 (chapter 9), Satthralope hasn't been out of her chair in 72 years, but it's only 71 years by page 165 (Chapter 18). Maybe Innocet missed noticing Satthralope's last trip away from the chair.

Why does Romana want a copy of the information in Lungbarrow's Loom? Why does she seem to suspect something about the Doctor's origins as The Other? She doesn't appear to have had access to any of the information that would suggest this.

How does Redred know that the Doctor's TARDIS is the same one that was stolen the night before his last memory? [Should he even know there had been a TARDIS stolen the night before?]

Glospin says 'I hope there was no-one still in there' when the Doctor disables the TARDIS - so what happens to Wolsey?

The Doctor claims that Dorothée is a convicted criminal. However, to the best of my knowledge, she's never even been on trial - and certainly not on Gallifrey!

Technobabble: The return of the Doctor's question-mark pullover. Chris' loud shirt with white shorts. Theora's labyrinthine hairdo which defies both gravity and description.

Dialogue Disasters: Omega, despite his sacrifice, still had a hand in their affairs.

Dialogue Triumphs: For a quasi-aware remote stellar manipulator that could tear open the furnaces of stars and dissect the angles of reality, it was fairly harmless. It just wasn't house-trained.

Andred: 'I told you not to come here when I'm working.'
Leela: 'You do nothing else but work when you are here.'

Leela: 'I will stay here at the Capitol, where the furniture does not argue if I want to sit on it.'

Almoner Yeux on Leela's request to contact the Doctor: 'Oh that Doctor, President Fly-by-night. Well, I'm afraid I can't help you on that count. Have you tried the President's office? That's what they deal with there, you know. Presidents. It's all quite logical.'

Leela: 'In my world, the old are revered for their wisdom. But if the old vines cling too tightly, we cut them back to let the young growth through.'

Glospin: 'You can't be a Prydonian - your face is too honest.'

Glospin on the Doctor: 'I'd know that ego anywhere.'

'In the Capitol, the only living things were narrow-minded keepers of lists. No matter what titles they found for themselves, they were all still keepers of lists.'

Leela: 'Be careful of the furniture. It can be as fierce as any beast in the forest.'

The Doctor: 'Will you stop interrogating me as if I'm the number one suspect?'
Chris: 'You are, Doctor.'

The Doctor: 'Look what Time did to me.'
Dorothée: 'Look what you did to Time.'

Dorothée: 'What is Otherstide?'
The Doctor: 'Just some silly pagan festival, like Yule or August Bank Holiday.'

The Doctor: 'I've dined at the tables of alien emperors and languished in their dungeons. I've seen whole galaxies born in the fires of the Aurora Temporalis. I've saved lives and taken them too. Which of you has even heard of the Frost-Fairs of Ice-Askar the Winter Star? Or dreamt of the torches burning on the canals of Venice?'

Time: 'Most of us regard being worshipped as a responsibility with expectations we try to live up to. There are some gods I could mention who are not nearly so considerate.'

Continuity: In the Old Time segments, there is a memorial to Omega in the Capitol. By this time in ancient Gallifrey, there are dissenters against Rassilon - he is treating them as rebels. A year after the Other disappears, Rassilon institutes a festival of freedom. Alarms sounded because the Hand had returned, disrupting the event. A curfew was then imposed. Omega's star was in the constellation of Ao, 9.6 light years from Gallifrey. Official records of the Other's appropriation of the Hand of Omega include The Triumphs of Rassilon, The Record of Rassilon, and The Book of the Old Time. The Citadel of the Time Lords (aka the Capitol) was built over a much older city.

Ace hasn't seen the Doctor for a year. She has been romantically involved with the painter Georges Seurat. Spandrell has recently (over a year ago) retired for the third and (probably) final time, and the new Castellan is Andred (who married Leela in The Invasion of Time). Andred is from the house of RedLooms. Leela's full Gallifreyan name is Leelandredloomsagwinaechegesima. She carries a pouch which contains a herbal liniment.

There is a Bureau of Loomographic Records, and a Space/Time Accessions Bureau. The Citadel Constraint Block is publicly known to belong to the Agency. The President is the only person outside the Agency to know the identity of any of its agents. (S)he is bound not to say. Once the Agency imprisons someone, their judgement is final. Lord Ferrain is its Director of Allegiance. Diplomatic immunity and the protection of the Presidential Revenue requires a vote of the Inner Council. Being designated Alien Ambassador to Gallifrey would require the consent of the Cardinals of the High Council. There are articles of emergency power that govern possible un-gallifreyan activity. This means that the Agency can investigate the President, have her impeached and removed from office. The Agency originated as Rassilon's personal guard. Lord Cardinal Lenadi was head of the Prydonian Chapter 673 years ago. The First Article of Generation forbids a house from weaving a cousin without consultation with the Central Population Directory. If an appeal is not lodged within 5 days, it and everything belonging to it will be deleted from the Matrix, and it will be cast out of its Chapter, its name no longer being known.

Romana's presidency has been characterised by rapid reform. She has initiated diplomatic relations with numerous species, including the Argolians. She has instituted a policy of Open Government, though her diplomatic negotiations are often secretive. There is still dissent, mostly from the Dromeian and Arcalian chapters, as well as a faction within the Agency. Her Patrexian Chancellor is Theorasdavoramilonithene.

Gallifreyan Houses are sentient, and have living furniture, which is vastly oversized. They also have drudges, wooden constructs which do things like the cooking - and which contain drawers. They have no head, but do have splintered necks from which hangs a mirror on a chain. The Houses can see through their mirrors. They have a particular link with the [usually female] housekeeper, one of the House's cousins who is responsible for running the House. This telepathic link is sealed with a wedding ceremony, including the housekeeper being given a plain wooden ring. However, the highest rank in the House is that of Kithriarch. The Mystery of the New Time is a play performed by House controlled puppets that was presumed lost, which portrays the time between the overthrow of the Pythia and the Other's disappearance. It was performed at Otherstide.

Cousins of Lungbarrow include the Doctor, Quences, Innocet, Glospin (Glospinninymortheras), Satthraloppe, Owis, Arkhew, Maljamin, Farg (who disappeared 200 years ago), Jobiska, Rynde, Celesia, Almund, Luton (who got stuck up the West Chimney 506 years ago, and could be heard regenerating for 11 Candledays), Tulgel, Chovor the Various, DeRoosifa, (many-chinned) Salpash, and Haughty Celesia. Owis was loomed 2 years before the Doctor's departure as a replacement for the Doctor. In the third century since Rassilon's death, Rassilon's Rampart was built to keep out marauding Shobogans. This is 2 days [walking?] from Lungbarrow. Lungbarrow was on top of Mount Lung, in the Southern Ranges, it overlooks the river Cadonflood. Quencessetianobayolocaturgrathadeyyilungbarrowmas is 422nd Kithriarch of Lungbarrow. Lungbarrow was entombed exactly 673 years ago. Quences was Ordinal-General of the Brotherhood of Kithriarchs. Satthrolope dismissed the hermit who used to live in a grotto on the slopes of Mount Lung. Innocet has a talent in mindreading, which is certified by the Syndicate of Cryptesthesians.

Gallifreyan playing cards are circular, and include the Ancient of Flames, the Three of Souls, the Six of Clouds, the Last of Deeps, the Duke of Dominoes, the Two of Deeps, the Twelve of Owls, the Hand of Souls, and the Rogue, which changes suit as it moves through the pack. There is a board game called Sepulchasm, which is susceptible to psychic influence. It periodically Sepulchasms, opening up, and the players have to will their counters to hover so they don't fall into the pedestal. Crooking fingers is how Gallifreyans agree on a bet or suchlike.

Gallifreyans have a certain amount of natural telekinetic ability. Later regenerations tend to be shorter than earlier ones, but over 7,000 seems to be a respectably old lifespan. Gallifrey's solar system includes fiery Karn, gas giant Polarfrey, and Kasterborus the Fibster. Gallifreyan fungi include feathergills, pogsquats, skullcaps, and cardinal's collars. It's explicitly stated that Gallifreyan time runs differently to time elsewhere in the universe.

The TARDIS bathroom's water is super-buoyant, and usually has the Doctor's plastic duck in it. Shutting the TARDIS down might be dangerous for anything living still inside, and can radically alter the internal architecture. Chris has never remembered his dreams. He never learnt nursery rhymes, having been put in front of the holovid. As a kid he hung about in Captain Jamboree's Fun-dungeon of Mystery at Lunar Park. This, as well as the Academy simulator ranges, used holo-environs. His class at the Academy had 26 members. 3 of them prematurely retired injured, 2 are dead.

K9 Mark I has the security codes to access the entire panotropic net from one port. The Agency is able to detect this. During the story, K9 Mark I has his memory upgraded by 71.1%, [to the capacity of K9 Mark II].

The Doctor has an Osirian bottle-opener and a sunshade in his pocket. Shortly before leaving Gallifrey, he was rejected for duteous advancement, so he had to continue as Scrutationary Archivist in the Bureau of Possible Events. This was stamped by the Registrar of Continual Observation. By that point there were type 53 TARDISes. He failed his chapter certificates in officiating and legislation - deliberately and miserably. Most of his Academy results were calculated to barely win a pass.

The Terrible Zodin (The Five Doctors, Attack of the Cybermen) was a sword-swallower at the Grand Festival of Zymymys Midamor.

Links: Dorothée, Romana, Leela, K9 Mark I, and K9 Mark II appear. Brief references to their past adventures include, The Face of Evil, The Invisible Enemy, The Invasion of Time, The Ribos Operation, City of Death, Warriors' Gate, The Leisure Hive, Remembrance of the Daleks, Silver Nemesis, Battlefield, Timewyrm: Exodus, Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible, Ace's time in Spacefleet, Blood Harvest, Set Piece, and Happy Endings. There is brief mention of Benny, the Master, the Brigadier, the Daleks, and the Chelonians. The Doctor mentions Ministers of Grace (Decalog: The Duke of Dominoes). Ace recalls having seen the fourth Doctor in her head, or photos, or somewhere (actually in a hologram during Timewyrm: Genesys).

A lot of the stuff about ancient Gallifrey builds on 'Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible', and' Remembrance of the Daleks.'

Chris remembers Roz's death (So Vile a Sin) and the recent events of The Room with No Doors. He recalls events from Return of the Living Dad. The background to Chris' telepathy is from 'SLEEPY'. There are a couple of brief references to Benny.

There are brief scenes of each of the Doctor's regenerations. Tersurus is mentioned in 'The Deadly Assassin'. The Doctor says he met Ferrain in 'Genesis of the Daleks'. The Doctor recalls first reading Thripsted's Flora and Fauna of the Universe (Abridged for Younger Readers) - the normal version was originally mentioned in The Sun Makers.

When Dorothée says that the Doctor would make a brilliant midwife, she's probably thinking of 'Tragedy Day'.

Leela: 'The Doctor brought us muffins in London'

The ending sets the scene for The TV Movie - with Romana giving the Doctor the mission to collect the Master's remains. The Doctor's response: 'Is this some new Skaro? Or the one that I destroyed with the Hand of Omega?' may be a deliberate foreshadowing of the impending retcon in War of the Daleks - where it is claimed that the Doctor didn't destroy Skaro after all.

Extras: This book was serialised as an e-book on the BBC website. The e-book version had a new cover, an illustration for each chapter, and a set of author's notes. It also contained several small, but significant, changes to the manuscript.

Location: The Capitol and the house of Lungbarrow, modern Gallifrey, the Capitol in ancient Gallifrey. Ace is taken from Paris, 2001.

Future History: During the 26th century, humans used high-impulse carbines in the Flova trenches against the Daleks. One razor lozenge can slice the legs off a Marsh-Dalek at sixty metres. During the second Dalek Imperium, there were singularity bombs being made on Skaro.

Unrecorded Adventures: There are numerous flashbacks of the Doctor's early life in the house of Lungbarrow, of his first trip in the TARDIS - to the Gallifreyan Old Time, and of events leading up to his departure from Gallifrey.

The Doctor has left many notes apologising to Leela for not visiting her.

The Doctor and Ace may both visit the ballet Le Sacre du Printeps at the Ballets Russes on 29th May 1913, Ace with a friend from 2000. Ace would have secured a stage box to see the riot in the Auditorium, and he Doctor would have been beating time with the drummers in the wings.

The Bottom Line: A good conclusion to the series. It's well written, all the characters are brilliantly done, and all the plot threads of the New Adventures were tied up. Not a book to recommend to non-fans because of the heavy continuity, but otherwise you can't fault it. I was a little disappointed that the e-book version chops out most of the end of Chapter 8 because it was very well written, and the bits that are left in feel horribly disjointed.

Discontinuity Guide by Stephen Gray

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